Conviction
by actionman81
Summary: Peggy Carter goes to sleep in 1945 Hayes Morrison awakes in 2016 Is there a connection?


1945

Peggy stirred in her sleep. The nightmare had returned  
"Peggy?" It was Steve. She heard his voice, "There's not going to be a safe landing, but I can try and force it down"  
"No. I'll call Howard, he'll know what to do"  
"There's not enough time. This thing's moving too fast and it's headed for New York. I've got to put her in the water"  
"Please don't do this. W-we have time. We can work it out"  
"Right now, I'm in the middle of nowhere. If I wait any longer, a lot of people are going to die. Peggy, this is my choice"  
Steve's voice came on again "Peggy,"  
"I'm here" she responded  
"I'm going to need a rain check on that dance," he tried to make his voice sound unafraid  
"All right. A week next Saturday at The Stork Club," she forced a smile, denying everything, just as he was  
"You've got it," he replied  
"Eight o'clock on the dot. Don't you dare be late. Understood?" she instructed  
"You know, I still don't know how to dance."  
"I'll show you how. Just be there."  
"We'll have the band play something slow. I'd hate to step on your-" his voice cut off abruptly  
"Steve?" she feared the worst, and knew that it had happened. He was gone.

2017

Hayes Morrison rolled over in bed, a lazy smile played on her lips. She'd been head of New York City's Conviction Integrity Unit for some time now, and loved her job, and loved her life. Every day, she got to put on stylish clothes, go downtown, to right the wrongs, to fight the power, and to stick it to the man, as she'd put it once.  
Her phone rang, and she picked it off the nightstand, she stared at the number. She didn't recognize it, but perhaps her party days were still catching up to her. She unlocked the phone and pressed it to her ear, "Hello?"  
"Peg, I'm glad I could reach you" the male voice on the other end sounded relieved  
"Wrong number" she ended the call

At the CIU, Hayes was back to work, rifling through papers, trying to find a key piece of evidence that would allow Tariq Wilson his freedom  
"Where is that paper" she bellowed  
"Probably where you least expect it" Wayne Wallis quipped  
"Back for more?" she eyed him from her seat  
"Not while you're around" he shot back  
"Who died and made you boss?" she turned back to her work  
"You'll get your chance" he smiled, "Just do your damn job"  
"Frankie" she called to one of her team, "Where's the interview from Wilson?"  
"Under the first folder on the second pile" he rattled off  
"Oh" she flipped through the folder  
"It was a mistake. I didn't mean to" she read from the file  
She frowned. Reread some of the material and concentrated.  
"I'm in this with you, 'til the end, Peggy" she heard a man's voice behind her  
Hayes whipped her head around. Nobody was there.  
"I'm going crazy working here" she mumbled, and stood up. It was time for a drink.

1947

Stark Labs

"A temporal anomaly?" Peggy stared at Dr. Jason Wilkes' mathematical equations, "You mean a rift in the space-time continuum?"  
"That's exactly what I mean" he grinned  
"That sounds like something out of Jules Vernes" Daniel looked on  
"Precisely" Wilkes agreed, "you see, it-"  
"I know what a temporal anomaly is" Carter cut him off  
"Then you know what it can do" Wilkes checked her knowledge  
"It can make the Zero Matter look like a child's Silly Putty"  
"Can you predict when the rift will open?" Peggy turned to Jason  
"I'm not really sure. It could happen at any time really"  
"We'll have to be on our guard at all times" Peggy cautioned the others

2017

Hayes relaxed in her office chair and nursed her drink. She remembered the day that Wayne Wallis had come to her with his job offer. Blackmail, really.  
"Come to gloat?" she'd quipped at him, while she stood in an interrogation room.  
"I've come to make you an offer"  
He'd offered to expunge her record in return for one special favor  
"I heard your university board has you on probation for sleeping with your student"  
"Students" she corrected him  
"I can make it all go away" he'd offered  
She'd been forced into the job. It was either that, or have a family crisis, since her mother was running for office, again.  
What she'd thought was a burden, had actually worked out rather well.  
True, she couldn't pick her team, but she could pick her cases  
"Fine" Wallis had grinned at her, "For the first one, give me a happy ending"  
She'd managed that, the first time around. She'd gotten Odell Dwyer freed, after being sentenced for killing his girlfriend, Anna Ramos. It had all been a mistake, he'd said. It had.  
In the end, everything had worked out, and Hayes was ready for more, more work, more justice.  
And yet, something felt hollow, missing, she just wasn't sure what, exactly.

She walked back to the paperwork that she'd left on the table. Hayes sighed; this case was going to be more of a challenge. This kid had managed to get arrested, even though he was disabled. The photo showed a teenager on crutches, smiling at the camera.  
In the back of her mind, Hayes remembered someone. A nice looking guy, wearing a sweater vest, and he had a crutch. There was something about him, but she couldn't remember what.  
Hayes looked up from her paperwork. She felt like someone was staring at her. She looked around. The office had glass walls that acted like internal windows, allowing people to see from one office into the hallway. She looked around, and then she saw him. A man in a suit, dark haired, with a mustache and a funny little beard. He spoke with one of the office's other lawyers, but now, now he was staring at her.  
"Hey", she grabbed an intern, "Who's that?"  
"Who's that? You never heard of Tony Stark?"  
"Stark" she repeated. The name sounded familiar to her.  
"Sure, his parents were killed twenty five years ago, and he runs Stark Industries"  
"Star-" she began, her voice trailed off. She was lost in a memory  
"My bad babies" a man spoke  
"Bad babies?" a British voice repeated  
"Inventions of mine" he explained  
Hayes looked at the intern, "He makes—inventions"  
The intern laughed, "You could say that. He's one of the richest men in America" he walked away  
Hayes looked through the glass wall. Tony Stark could not take his eyes off of her.

1947

At the Arena Club, Hugh Jones and the Council sat around their table, discussing plans  
"That—that Agent, as she called herself, has got to be stopped"  
"What can we do?" Mortimer Hayes questioned  
"I have something in mind" Jones smiled, "We just have to wait for Mr. Stark to come up with something that we can use"

2017

After work, Hayes walked through the streets of New York, hoping to catch the bus home. She'd already had enough to drink, and was in no condition to drive tonight. She stood on the corner, and waited for the cross walk sign to change its lit up colors. Across the street, a blonde couple stood as well, waiting to cross the street that was perpendicular to the one which Hayes was on. The man wore a blue denim jacket, white t-shirt, and jeans. The woman had on business casual attire. They looked very much in love. She turned to him, smiled as they held hands and walked away across the street. Hayes' light changed and she headed in the direction of the corner that the couple had been standing at. Something caught the man's eye, and he nudged his girlfriend. They both looked at Hayes as she strode across the New York City street, a confident stride in her step.  
The man looked at her, wide eyed, practically gawking. The women, instead of lashing out at him or verbally berating him, had a look of pure astonishment as well. The man put a cupped hand to his mouth, and cried out, "Peggy! Peggy, it's me. It's Steve!"  
Hayes ignored him. She smirked, thinking that he must have her confused with someone else.

That night, she settled into bed, a pile of casework on her nightstand, a glass of wine in her hand.  
She sipped it, and glanced over her case files. Hayes looked through her phone, as she did before she slept for the night. She scrolled past posts and updates, Likes and emoticons. Then, something stopped her. She froze, and stared at the screen.  
"President Pierce presided over the ceremony, putting law 616-B into effect. Any and all ties to the Strategic Scientific Reserve will be seen as treason against the United States" Alexander Pierce had been the President for a scant eight months, but he had already put changes in place.  
The President was quoted as saying, "To build a better world sometimes means tearing the old one down. And that makes enemies"  
Hayes recoiled in horror. That term, the Strategic Scientific Reserve. She'd – she'd heard it somewhere. An image of men, staring at her, came into her mind. They thought she was nothing without them. "Because, unless I have your reports, your coffee, or your lunch, I'm invisible" she blurted out to the empty room.  
Morrison laughed at herself. Imagine her, fetching coffee, or files for men. What a laugh. She shut her phone, and lay back in bed, and hoped for sleep.

Hayes Morrison slept, fitfully, as she saw, or dreamed of, another place, another time, another life.  
"I'll do it" a British woman spoke  
"No; I built it, badly as it turns out. It's my responsibility" a mustached man interjected  
"Let me" an African American man spoke up, "I was sent back the first time. There's a chance that it'll happen again"  
A tall British man put his opinion in, "I feel I'm to blame for this."  
"It wouldn't be the first suicide mission I've come back from" the cocky blonde man put in  
The mustached man looked over to the side and quipped, "Well, that's not fair"  
"Daniel, get back here" the British woman called out  
Hayes turned in her dream and looked, along with the others, a man had thrown an aluminum crutch aside, and had now tied a hose to himself and to a lamp post, and was slowly inching his way to a metal box with a crank on it.  
"Keep working on a way to shut it down" he looked at her. At Hayes. "If you figure it out, I'll bail"  
There was something about him, this man in her dream. She looked at the group, as they struggled to keep him from being pulled upward into the – the—what was that? A great tear in the sky swirled above everyone.  
The man, Daniel, turned back. He took Haye's hand. "I missed you, Peggy. You know that I'm in this with you, until the end" he smiled.  
"Until the end" his words repeated.  
Hayes Morrison woke up. Something wasn't right.

1947

"It's happening" Wilkes shouted. Above them, the skies had turned dark over a matter of moments. Swirling clouds loomed high overhead.  
Peggy Carter stepped forward. She needed a closer look at this.  
The SSR was investigating the temporal anomaly, as Dr. Wilkes had called it, but now, now the anomaly was a fully formed rift. A veritable tear in the sky had opened up. Instead of inky blackness like with the Zero Matter, however, now a blinding white light shone from the skyward tear.  
Hugh Jones stepped out of the back of the luxury car he'd driven in. The Arena Club had heard about the tear in the sky, and his curiosity had gotten the better of him. He stared at the rift opened.  
Peggy Carter felt herself being lifted up. She tried in vain to force herself down.  
"Peggy!" Daniel shouted. He lunged for her, but couldn't reach. He balanced on his good leg, and pushed his crutch upward, into the sky, "Grab hold of this" he shouted.  
She was too high up. Floating, as it appeared, up into the rift  
Daniel turned to Wilkes, "Shut it down. Turn it off. Do something. Now!"  
"I'm trying" Wilkes looked apologetic, "I'm doing everything that I can, but I didn't open the rift. It happened on its own"  
"Peggy" Daniel screamed into the light.  
In a flash, she was gone. The light was sucked into itself. The dark skies lightened, and it was as if nothing had occurred. The only change was that Peggy Carter was nowhere to be found.  
Hugh Jones smiled, "Perhaps this can be used to our advantage" he thought

2016

"We have some correspondence, Mr. Pierce" the agent handed Alexander Pierce the envelope.. Senator Pierce looked at the aged paper envelope. It was strange. He waited until the agent left him, and then he sat down and flipped the envelope in his hands. A letter, who wrote those anymore?  
He looked at the date. 1947. Bizarre.  
Pierce opened the letter  
He smiled as he read to himself. This would be very beneficial. Very beneficial, indeed.

2017

Hayes Morrison scanned the obituaries. She wasn't sure what she was looking for. Something about the man in her dream, the one with the crutch. When he'd looked at her, with eyes warm and yet, so wise, she'd remembered something, a feeling that she'd had, but she couldn't recall ever feeling that way about anyone, really.  
"Burning the midnight oil?" Wayne Wallis appeared next to her  
"Something like that" she waved him away  
His name was Daniel. There have to be a million Daniels here.  
"Disabled" she typed.  
The new keywords didn't bring the total down by any. Hayes sighed. What was she doing here? Looking for a ghost of a dream?  
Still, she went back, through the obituary files. Back, 1999, 1998, 1997, farther, 1987, 1986, 1985, reaching onward, 1964, 1955, 1948- there.  
Those eyes. Those warm, wise eyes.  
Hayes Morrison sat on the swivel chair, transfixed by the photo on the screen. Black and white, it showed the headshot of a young man. Daniel Sousa.  
Something in the back of her mind pulled at her, tugged at her memory, but she couldn't shake the thought loose.  
She read  
"Military career"  
"Injury in war"  
"Amputation"  
"Strategic Scientific Reserve"  
"Sousa was killed during a Hydra attack on the SSR base in Los Angeles in 1948"  
Hayes closed her eyes. Deep, behind her work, behind her drinking, behind her wild party days, there was something. She shut out the world, and sat there, concentrating.  
"Nothing to say?" a man's voice said deep inside her mind, "no quick comeback?"  
Then, a sudden wave of emotion hit her. She felt him, their mouths pressed together, she remembered wanting him so badly, right there, right now.  
She opened her eyes. Hayes swallowed. She could almost taste him.  
Daniel.  
She blinked. What was she even thinking? Imagine, kissing a man who had been dead for nearly seventy years.

That evening, she walked down to the corner crosswalk. Before she got there, she saw them. The blonde couple. Today, the woman was more casually dressed, but the man had on a dress shirt, slacks and suspenders. He looked like something out of a 1950s play. She overhead their dialogue  
"You're crazy" the woman smiled at the man, "It can't be her"  
"It has to be. It just has to, and I'm going to prove it" he was adamant  
"And if you prove it, then what?"  
"I—I don't know" he sighed, "I just have to find out, at least for myself"  
He turned to Hayes, "Hello. I'm sorry to bother you, but – you see, you—well,"  
The woman stepped in front of him, "Hi, you happen to look like someone he used to know" she forced a smile. Hayes thought she could see a twinge of sadness in the woman's eyes  
"This is Sharon" the man explained, "And I'm – I'm Steve. Steve Rogers" he extended his hand  
She shook it, "Nice to meet you Steve. I'm Hayes Morrison" she smiled  
Steve looked as if someone had slapped him  
Now it was Sharon's turn to speak up, "We lost a dear aunt of mine, and you bear an awful striking resemblance to her, when she was younger"  
"Here" Steve dug a pocket watch out of his pants. No, it was a locket. It was something.  
He opened it up, and inside was a black and white photograph, of her. It looked like it had been clipped from a newspaper article  
Something pulled at her memory. Hayes looked at him, really looked at Steve, in his eyes. "You—you were on an airplane, and it – crashed in the water"  
"How does she know that?" Sharon looked stunned  
"I had a dream" Hayes was lost in thought, and spoke as if she was just realizing things now, "I dreamt that – that you were talking to me, over a phone, or"  
"An int-" Steve began  
"No, wait" Sharon held his hand, "let her speak"  
"A phone of some kind, and" the memories floated to her consciousness, piece by piece, as she mentally put things together, "we were supposed to dance"  
"Yes" Steve smiled, but then the realization hit him, "If you're – her, then what are you doing here?"  
"Her? I'm Hayes, Hayes Morrison" she snapped back at him  
"Look, I'm sorry" Steve sighed, "I wish my friend Tony could talk to you. Tony Stark"  
"I don't know any Tony Stark" she frowned, "I know a – a" she stopped  
"What happened?" Steve asked. They were still standing on the street corner  
Hayes licked her lips, "Does the name Howard mean something to you?"  
Steve grinned, "Yes, yes it does"

At Steve Rogers' apartment, Hayes poured over the newspaper clippings strewn in front of her. People she thought she had remembered, but things had changed.  
"Howard, Daniel, Jason, Angie" she rattled off names, glancing from one article to another, "Daniel Sousa, killed during a Hydra attack" she sighed, "Howard Stark and his wife, Maria, murdered in December 1991 by a Hydra bionic soldier", "Dr. Jason Wilkes, killed in his laboratory during an experiment" she scoffed, "Probably Hydra was behind that, too"  
"You don't know the half of it"  
"Where do you, and Tony, where do you all work?"  
"At the SSR"  
"Who- who's running it?"  
"That's the thing" Steve explained, "Once President Pierce came into power, things have gone from bad to worse"  
"Oh" Hayes' face crumpled  
"Phil Coulson used to lead us" Sharon sat down next to Steve, "but he was killed"  
"From then" Steve continued, "We've been underground"  
"The Underground SSR, so to speak" Sharon finished  
Steve looked at Sharon, and then at Hayes, "Do me a favor"  
"Okay" she sighed. It had been an incredibly long day for her  
"Close your eyes, and listen to me, and don't think, just say what you feel inside"  
She frowned  
"Trust me" he smiled  
Hayes closed her eyes  
Steve sighed. He wasn't sure about this. He wasn't sure about anything, but, he had to try. He glanced at Sharon. She nodded. She trusted whatever he thought he had to do  
"There's not gonna be a safe landing, but I can try and force it down" Steve spoke through a cupped hand covering his mouth  
Hayes mouth seemed to have a mind of its own. The words tumbled out before she could think about them, "I-I'll get Howard on the line. He'll know what to do."  
Steve took her hand, "I'm sorry I couldn't make our date" he smiled, but tears ran down his face  
Hayes opened her eyes, "I'm sorry, too"  
Hayes' cell phone rang. She glanced at the caller identification, "Wayne"  
Without thinking, she answered the call, "I'm sorry" a British accent tumbled out, "I believe you've reached the wrong telephone number" and hung up.  
She looked at Steve, "Thank you" she smiled.  
He smiled, "You're welcome, Peggy"

2016

"Are you sure this will work?" the agent looked at Pierce  
"It has to" he scowled, "I read about her in my history books. Now, it's time to change the course of history, to our advantage" he smiled  
The agent clipped electrodes onto the sleeping woman's temples  
"Goodbye, Agent Carter" Pierce looked down at her, lying practically lifeless on the table, "Hello, Hayes Morrison"

2017

At Steve's apartment, Peggy was awash in emotions  
"Steve" she kept smiling. She couldn't believe he was here, with her, again. Yet, she remembered what she'd read in the obituaries, "Daniel" her heart ached. How could he be dead, and how could he have died so horrifically  
"Because I wasn't there" she spoke to no one in particular  
"What?" Steve asked, genuinely concerned  
"I remembered" she explained, "Dr. Wilkes, he works for Howard, was trying to find a way to replicate something called Zero Matter, but stumbled onto a temporal rift, a rip in the very fabric of time and space. I was pulled into it, in 1947, and ended up here, now.  
Because I was pulled away, I wasn't there to help Howard run a project he had wanted to build, and I wasn't there to help Daniel, and now he's lost, forever" she blinked back tears  
"Daniel" Steve looked at her, "You two were, close?"  
"We all thought you'd died, Steve" she felt horrid "I didn't mean to be a chippy who plays with mens' affections"  
"I never said you were" he smiled, "I couldn't expect you to wait around for me" he glanced down and then was back up, looking into her eyes, "Do you want to go back?"  
"I, I don't know if I can"  
"When I'm in a tight spot, I think about you, and how you'd handle things" he took her hand, "What would you do? What would Peggy do?"  
Peggy Carter gritted her teeth and mustered her resolve. "I'd find out who did this to me, and I'd make them pay"  
"That's my best girl" Steve smiled

Peggy stared at the computer screen. Hundreds of search results appeared in front of her. How was she going to get through all this? Deduction; she soon figured how to narrow the search results to give her what she wanted. In a strange way, the memories, the false memories, helped her. She understood computers, and the internet, and the concept of wireless- what was it? Wi-fi, yes, wi-fi.  
"How's it coming?" Steve brought her a cup of coffee  
"Its – coming" she glanced at him, and back at the screen. There would be time for reuniting properly, if that's what she could do. Peggy pushed thoughts of Steve, and their awaited dance, out of her head for the moment. There was work to be done.  
The name "Hayes Morrison" brought several search results, but as she looked far back, they were all based on similar news accounts, detailing a sordid past, many without photographs, and others, that seemed outlandish to her, Peggy.  
"So whoever Hayes Morrison is, she's not me, not actually me" Peggy thought. Hayes could be real; she could be dead, and someone put those memories into her. There was only one group so insidious and evil that they would stoop to such a plan, even just to be rid of her. "Hydra" she said to the screen.  
"Hydra is still around?" Steve pulled a chair up next to her. Sharon did the same  
"During my—life—my time" Peggy started, "We'd cleaned out the last known Hydra base, in 1945, in Austria"  
Steve and Sharon listened intently, "The Howling Commandoes had taken control and we'd managed to move all their artifacts, inventions and devices back to the SSR labs, but Reinhart didn't—wouldn't talk" she sighed, "In the end, it's hard to say exactly what could have happened"  
"I think I understand" Sharon spoke. Steve stared at her  
"Like this" Sharon drew a horizontal line on a piece of paper, "This is a timeline. It starts here" she drew an X, "and goes on" she drew an arrow at the other end.  
"What if" she began, "something happened at a point in time, and you disappeared from your timeline, but ended up here, today, with us, except this, what we know here, is an alternate timeline" she drew a line jutting out from the original timeline, and then another horizontal line connected to the tangent  
"Hydra might be something, in another world, another timeline, because you were there to stop it. However, right here, right now, President Pierce is in control, and while Steve, Tony and I, and others have had our doubts, there's little that we can while he's in power"  
"So" Peggy realized, "you're saying that if I went back, I could stop these changes?  
"You could, in theory" Sharon agreed  
Peggy could practically read Steve's mind. She was sure he was thinking about her, but it was so obvious that he had something now with Sharon

1947

"What do you mean she vanished?" Sousa leaned against the car  
"I don't know" Wilkes struggled  
Hugh Jones looked on  
Sousa saw him and hobbled over, "You" he gripped Jones' jacket in his right hand, "You bastard, you and your Council have something to do with this, don't you?"  
"Do you know who I am?" Jones put on an air of superiority  
"You'll be a dead man when I'm done with you!" Sousa raised his crutch to beat Hugh Jones  
"You can't touch me, the SSR won't stand for it" Jones laughed  
Daniel stopped. Jones was right. The SSR was a lot of things, but it wasn't a group of bullies. He pushed Jones into the dirt  
"You're not worth it" he spat out the words  
"Give me a hand, here" Jason Wilkes looked at the sky. The temporal rift had closed up, and there had to be a way to open it.  
"I need to look at these readings" he gripped a handheld device  
"What is that?"  
"It's similar to Dr. Erskine's device that could detect Vita-Radiation, except this was modified to itemize what's causing the temporal rift"  
"And what is it saying now?" Daniel asked. Behind him, Jones raced for his car and sped off while the two men struggled to figure out what had happened  
"I'm not sure" Wilkes sighed, "It shows that, in the most basic terms, a temporal rift is a distortion in the spacetime continuum, which can allow for temporal displacement through space and time."  
"Great" Sousa forced a smile, "How does that help get her back?"  
"We'll have to go back to the lab" he meant Stark Labs  
"But—Peggy" Sousa waved at the sky where the temporal rift had been  
"If I can get her back, it won't necessarily be right here"  
"If?" Sousa frowned  
"I'll do my best" Wilkes tried to look upbeat

Stark Labs

"It's been hours" Sousa paced back and forth, hobbled really. Wilkes looked from charts to equations to several open notebooks strewn out across the table he was working at.  
"What can I do to help?" Sousa was afraid that he'd lost Peggy forever  
Wilkes thought for a moment, "When Mr. Stark's inventions were at the SSR lab, there was a log of everything, including a few items that weren't exactly his."  
"What are you talking about?"  
"I have an idea, but it'll take research. Just help me out"  
Daniel poured over the logs. There were several items listed, each with descriptions and photographs pasted onto the pages  
"What am I looking for?" Daniel asked, turning the pages  
"Something called a chrono—chrono- deflector"  
Sousa searched, "Blitzkrieg Button, Cyclotron, here it is, Chrono-Deflector. Item number seventy eight"  
Wilkes quickly found the box needed and opened it  
"What the hell is that?" Sousa stared at the device  
"According to the research, in 1945, Austria, the last known Hydra site was taken over by the SSR. This was one of the items"  
"Those were all artifacts, ancient things" Sousa looked quizzically at the device  
"Apparently, some items were quite advanced" Wilkes lifted it out of the box.

2017

"I—I have to go" Peggy blinked back tears  
"How?" Steve asked  
"I'll, I'll find a way. I always do, right?"  
Steve smiled, "That's why you're my best girl"  
"I know" she sighed  
"Before we get into this, there's something that I've got to do" he took her hand, "May I have this dance?"  
Peggy smiled, "Of course"  
Steve pressed a button on a remote, and a 1940s slow song played: Doris Day's "Again"  
Steve pulled Peggy close. She rested her head on his shoulder. It felt so good.  
Over the speakers, Doris Day sang,  
"Again, this couldn't happen again  
This is that once in a lifetime"

Peggy held him close. She could feel the warmth of his body against her

Doris Day sang,  
"What's more, this never happened before  
Though I have prayed for a lifetime  
That such as you would suddenly be mine

Mine to hold as I'm holding you now and yet never so near  
Mine to have when the now and the here disappear  
What matters, dear, for"

The lyrics weren't lost on Peggy. Perhaps Steve had played this song for that specific reason. How amazing it would be to work, and live, and fight alongside Steve, as she'd done - nearly a century ago. She squeezed her eyes shut tight. Tears fell onto his shoulder. At least she was getting a chance. One last chance.

Peggy looked up to see Steve's eyes were wet with tears as well  
They held each other and moved together, yet alone

Doris Day finished the song,  
"When this doesn't happen again  
We'll have this moment forever  
But never, never again"

Peggy clung to Steve, and he embraced her just as tightly.

1947

"If this works, the device should generate a powerful tachyon pulse and form a temporal rift"  
"Will it get her back?" Daniel leaned on his crutch  
"Hopefully" Jason shrugged, "But, it'll also produce a lot of tachyokinetic energy as a byproduct of working the machine. It might burn itself out, and be unable to be used again"  
"So, if it fails, we won't have another shot at this?"  
"Essentially"  
"You know how I feel about her, and I've got a good idea about how you feel—felt—feel about her" Daniel sighed, "Does the pro outweigh the cons?"  
"I'm not usually a betting man" Wilkes looked at the agent, "but in this case, I'd do whatever I could if it would bring her back"  
Daniel smiled, "I couldn't imagine life without her. Let's do this" he nodded  
Wilkes turned on the machine. It hummed, and warmed to the touch. He pointed it at an empty corner of the lab. A beam of light shone on the wall, as though the machine was nothing more than an oversized flashlight  
"Is it working?" Daniel frowned  
"I believe so" Jason looked at the device  
The beam shone brighter until there was nothing visible but a white hot light.

2017

Peggy held Steve. They moved together, though the song had ended. Sharon stood a few feet away and looked on  
"I can't stay here" Peggy looked at him, at her beloved, Steve, "I'd moved on, and met someone else"  
"Of course" he forced a smile, "how could anyone say no to you?" He knew that this couldn't last. It shouldn't. Maybe  
"You and Sharon?" she gazed into his eyes  
"Yeah" he shrugged, "She's your-" he stopped  
"My, my what?"  
"She reminded me of you" he lied. There was no need to hurt her more than she'd already been.  
"What the hell is that?" Sharon shrieked  
Steve and Peggy turned around. In the middle of the room, a white beam of light slashed the space in two, and tore itself open until a grown man could slip inside.  
Peggy forced herself to smile, "That's my ride"  
She leaned forward and kissed him, then broke the kiss, broke the embrace, and rushed headlong into the white hot rift  
Daniel needed her.

1947

"Is it— doing what it should?" Daniel stared at the beam of light  
The beam shone brighter, hotter, blindingly white, until neither man could see anything. The room darkened until it was natural light once again. Daniel opened his eyes.  
There she was  
Peggy ran to him. They embraced  
"Oh, my darling" she whispered into his ear. She kissed him  
Sousa's prosthetic leg buckled, and they both fell to the floor, a mess of intertwined arms and legs  
Jason Wilkes stepped forward and offered them both a hand up. They gratefully took his assistance.  
"After a day like this, I could use a drink" Jason used humor to alleviate the serious situation  
"That sounds smashing" Peggy agreed, "Whiskey, gentlemen?"  
"Sounds great to me" Daniel smiled  
As they walked out, Peggy realized that the singer had been wrong. Love doesn't come only once in a lifetime, and then never again.  
She'd been given another chance. She wasn't going to squander it.  
She looked at Daniel and knew that she'd made the right choice.  
It was her choice, her decision, her conviction.


End file.
